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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
If you hear that something is “poured out”, what comes to your mind? Bad wine and sour milk came to my mind as things “poured out”, though when I was a child we used up that sour milk in sour-milk pancakes. Earlier this week when I asked other people what the expression “poured out” made them think of, a couple were like me and thought of things that were being “disposed of” or “wasted”. Quite a different idea is behind the expression “pouring out” in tonight’s Gospel Reading when Jesus says His blood is “poured out”. Aside from the meaning, we might not even be used to hearing Jesus say that His blood is “poured out”. In what are called the “Words of Institution” in the liturgy of the Divine Service, instead of “poured out”, Jesus says His blood is “shed”, which is how several English Bible versions translate that same Greek verb the Gospel writers use. In fact, the reports of Jesus’s instituting His Holy Supper not only differ between English Bible versions, but the reports of the Institution also differ between the Gospel accounts themselves, even in the Greek. Those divinely-inspired differences should not alarm us, however, for the four reports of the Institution unanimously agree on the most‑important things about the Institution: things such as, what the Supper is, what its benefits are, and who is to receive it. I have tried to capture a couple of those most‑important things in tonight’s sermon theme, “Body and Blood for You”.
Listening last week to reports about the healthcare law being debated before the U‑S Supreme Court, I was struck by how persuasive some of the arguments were on both sides. For example, attorneys challenging the law argued the government cannot require people to buy something they do not want. On the other hand, attorneys for the government argued they should require all people to buy insurance because, when those people presently without insurance end up needing healthcare that they cannot afford, taxpayers unfairly end up paying their expenses. Surely at least some of those people presently without insurance would buy insurance if they could afford it, but others admittedly do not think they need healthcare insurance. Those who do not think they need any healthcare insurance are arguably in denial—a denial not unlike that denial which some in the world have in regards to their sin and a denial not that unlike that denial which they and others possibly also have in regards to their need for the Holy Supper.
Even though St. Mark in tonight’s Gospel Reading does not record Jesus saying that His body and blood are given for the forgiveness of our sins, what St. Mark does record Jesus saying nevertheless is properly understood that way. Jesus gives bread He says is His body, and Jesus gives wine He says is His blood, the blood of the covenant, poured out, for many. His body and blood may be separated because a death on account of sin separates them, and the new covenant, as God foretold through Jeremiah, relates to forgiving iniquity and forgetting sin. “Pouring out” relates to a violent, sacrificial death to make atonement for sin, and that He does it “for” many also indicates that it is a sacrifice taking the place of those who deserve to die for their sins. Anyone’s denying that sin is in the context of the reading is difficult, as is our denying that each of us is sinful. We have spent Lent reflecting on our sinfulness and the death we deserve. We have repeatedly heard God’s call for us to turn in sorrow from our sin and to trust Him to forgive that sin for Jesus’s sake. Our being here tonight is in all likelihood a good sign, all the more if we have come with an appetite for the Holy Supper, which more than anything else gives us the forgiveness of our sins.
You could not tell from the English Standard Version read tonight, nor can you really tell from any of the English translations I reviewed as part of my sermon preparation, but the main thing Jesus does in tonight’s Gospel Reading is give. Pretty much everything else—the taking of both the bread and cup, the blessing and giving thanks, to some extent even the breaking of the bread—pretty much everything else is all secondary to the giving (and everything else probably is also secondary to the speaking Jesus does to give the new interpretation to the old Passover meal). Where your and my sins have earned us death, Jesus, out of His great love for us, freely gives Himself to a brutal and shameful death on the cross. By His death, He gives us life. We do not earn life, for we cannot earn life. The Gospel Reading and more so the Holy Supper itself are all about Gospel gift. When we turn in sorrow from our sin and trust God to forgive our sin for Jesus’s sake, God does just that: He forgives our sin, whatever our sin might be. Our salvation, St. Paul wrote to the Ephesians, is God’s gift, by grace through faith.
The individual faith, or trust, that God gives to you and to me makes two important leaps, understood in the positive way. First, each of us as a sinner believes that we individually are included in the “many” for whom Jesus’s blood of the covenant was poured out. (You heard two Sundays ago how that “many” is actually comprehensive and includes “all”.) Second, we believe the “simple, clear, certain and truthful words of Christ”: bread is His body, and wine is His blood. As Jesus says in St. John’s Gospel account, Jesus is the living bread that came down from heaven; He is the bread of life, the bread He gives for the life of the world is His flesh, for His flesh is true food, and His blood is true drink, whoever comes to Him will not hunger, and whoever believes will never thirst but will live forever. But, Jesus says, if you do not eat His flesh and drink His blood, you have no life in you.
Already in Jesus’s day, such teaching about eating Jesus cost Him followers, even as, in the years since, the continued teaching of His real, physical presence in the Holy Supper has divided those who believe His words from those who reject them. There should be no surprise that Jesus was to be eaten, since portions of certain Old Testament sacrifices were eaten, so that those eating could have a share in them and appropriate their blessings. Similarly, there should be no surprise that our Lord Jesus Christ, with His two natures as God and man, is really, physically present in bread that remains bread but is also His body and wine that remains wine but is also His blood. Tonight’s Old Testament Reading says the leaders of the people of Israel beheld God and ate and drank, and tonight’s Epistle Reading says that the bread is a participation (or, a “communion”) in the body of Christ and that the wine is a participation (or, a “communion”) in the blood of Christ. All of our Lord’s table fellowship with sinners and all of His miraculous feedings point us to this far‑greater table fellowship with sinners and to this far‑greater miraculous feeding. Here, in His poured‑out blood, blessings are poured out upon us.
I mentioned previously that earlier this week I asked some people what the expression “poured out” made them think of, and a couple pleasantly surprised me with the response that it made them think of “blessings poured out” or of “themselves pouring out their lives in service”. Both are good biblical answers, to be sure, as the Holy Spirit was poured out on Pentecost, and as St. Paul referred to himself as being “poured out” (though admittedly he used a different but apparently somewhat synonymous Greek verb). Led by the Holy Spirit, we likewise have our lives poured out as God works through us to serve those around us. We are sustained on this way by Christ’s body given and blood poured out for us. Insignificant differences in wording do not change the undeniable truth that remains for us to believe: what Christ gives you is “Body and Blood for You”.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +